Life in Detail

26 October

Well, the training’s done, over, shikenan. I think it went petty well, though the ulcers it gave me have probably shaved a few years off my life. We managed to have bedding for everyone and came in under budget (though that’s mostly due to no one being able to come from Zinder). Friday was a bit of a panicked mess, due to miscommunication somewhere between me and Dr. B. I’d spoken to him that morning and asked if he was ready for the training -I had thought he was going to give us a tour of INRAN and tell about the seed storage and entomology work they do there. Then he left for Mayahi, a couple hours away. I panicked. Turned out to be no big deal. He got me hooked up with Ilia, one of the scientists, and, once it got explained to him, it turned out really well. He took us around, explained everything in Hausa, which is really cool as you find a lot of the educated people don’t want to speak local language any more - only French. He took us around and answered questions and taught them how to use the PICS bags (the airtight ones) and it went really well. The crisis was averted. Then it came time for bed/dinner. INRAN has a couple of guest houses for trainings and visitors. They’d pointed out the one we were going to be staying in ahead of time but I hadn’t been in yet. No worries. So, we get to the one we’d been assigned and there’re people in it - 3 guys on their way to Diffa. Okay, I’m now totally confused, but INRAN has other guest houses and I figure they’ll put us in another one. No big deal as long as wherever we are has two rooms - men and women can NOT share sleeping space. So, I call the guy in charge, he comes over and convinces the others - one of whom has malaria for crying out loud - to move into the other house. I felt like such an evil hadjia/colonizer. It was awful. They didn’t seem too upset about it - which makes it that much worse. Being white should not be enough to make them move. They kept calling me ‘Madame’ as if I was more important or some nonsense. Mortifying. I tried explaining that it wasn’t necessary - we needed a house to sleep in, not that house particularly. I tried to make it up to them with food - typical me  which they seemed to appreciate. Then it turned out that one of the three was a Japanese scientist who needed to room with AC so we gave him the smaller of the two rooms in our house, where we had been planning on putting our guys and our guys went and slept in the other house with the other two Nigeriens. All in all it was probably a good set up as far as kumya (shame) was concerned and it let us women - 4 PCVs and one counterpart - chill a little bit. Literally - the house had AC and fans and we cranked them as high as possible. Plus, real toilets! Always a bonus. Then called mom for her ??th birthday, finally collapsing into a stupor until the next morning.

The next day was a lot better. We got tea and breakfast (bread + sweetened condensed milk == crack) and off to a bit of a late start, which was actually ok as it was, I thought, only me presenting. My spiel went really well - they all said I had Hausa so yay on that. The presentation itself was a PowerPoint on Jody’s computer that I’d put together, all by myself, in Hausa. I sort of felt like a kindergartener at show and tell ‘look at my pretty presentation in local language!’ The presentation basically says pick the best seeds from the best plants in your filed and keep them safe until next year when you plant them. If they repeat this year after year their crops will improve and they’ll get bigger better harvests. They got that, no worries, but then we got to the hard part - hunger season. Hunger season is the period before the new years’ harvest when the last of the prior year’s food is gone and people eat maybe one meal a day, if they’re lucky. I was lucky in that hunger season in my village was unpleasant and everyone got painfully thin, but no one actually died. Other villages weren’t so lucky - in some places not everyone was even able to make hurra, the watered down millet drink that most of my villagers lived on. So, keeping buhus (50-100kg grain sacks) full of edible seed out of their stomachs just so they can plant with them seems an unnecessary hardship. I feel that every other phrase out of my mouth was ‘saboda gobe’ (lit. Because of tomorrow.) My solution was that they start caisses in their villages and only tap into them when the grain runs out. Better the money go for grain than more wives. Issaka I just told to give me his buhus and I’d store them because he knows I’m stubborn and wouldn’t give them back to him until planting time. All of them I told to imagine me brandishing a large stick if they even so much as thought of opening their bags before planting. 5’7” of pure intimidation I am. A lot of saboda gobes. Then, good timing, just as I’m wrapping up, Dr. B arrives with an exercise examining the different varieties of beans available to them, followed by a neat PowerPoint on the science behind PICS bags and the nasty little bugs that like to eat beans. We then ate tons of lunch - shinkafa da wake (rice and beans with oil, Hausa style; our intestines are probably reminiscent of those of seabirds after the Exxon-Valdez) - and they all went home. Barkatou helped me haul the last of the stuff away and we caught a ride with a nice INRAN car back to the hostel. The end.

Of course, this being me, I then almost immediately had to catch a kabokabo (motorcycle taxi, the only ones that will willingly go all the way out to INRAN) back as I realized I’d left my Leatherman there. I swear I’d forget my head… Got it back alright and got to tour INRAN’s housing more - the guy guarding it for me had gone home for lunch (in his car, to his A/C’d home, with satellite TV…) so the kabo guy and I toured all over. I am soooo getting a motorcycle when I get home.


28 October

Spent most of the rest of Sunday and Monday vegetating and watching movies, finishing the report for the training and trying to schedule visits for the villages that have bean projects. Not, after all that, that it turns out I’ll be going to those villages - Dr. K has managed to foul the works up again and I’ve had it. After I pointed out, with O (our regional head)’s backing, that our agreement was for data only, he declared he wasn’t going to pay for any data collection and stated that I was being deliberately troublesome because of A, the last volunteer who had to work with him and whom he eventually made so fed up that she ET’d. Insulting and unprofessional. So, I forwarded all his texts to Ousmane and Sangare and headed to my village. Shike nan.

As it stands it’s 3:30 Tuesday and I’ve heard nothing. It’s been a busy morning though. I began the day by ripping down the millet stalk wall of my shade hangar, sweeping it and my yard out, and burning the accumulated debris. Then I killed 10+ spiders inhabiting the hangar and set up my bed and net. It’s so nice under there with the open air - much better than the stuffy ickyness it was before. With the two linen pieces I installed for shade I’ve got my own little pavilion - Ghanima makes it Michael Parkes’ Persepolis. Next stop was a full sweep of the front room (quite scary) in preparation for setting up the new trunk I picked up from the hostel cleanout - slowly but surely it’s looking more like a home and less like a hastily constructed tent. Then it was time to weigh the millet. Turns out I have over 20 kilos (50ish pounds) of grain, over half of which is to be used for planting next year. The rest I gave to Issaka’s wives for cooking tuwo. Oh, and lest I forget, coming back yesterday I was just in time for the meeting of the womens’ asusu. They’ve got a lot of kokari and now that the harvest is in and people have money they’ve upped dues to 50f/week. I’m really proud of Sa’a - she’s organized everything very well. I’d love to get her one of the big fancy ledgers teachers use to keep track of attendance/grades - right now she’s got an abused little 50-page notebook that you pick up for 100f at the market. In a perfect world I’d get her a fancy laptop with Excel - so not going to happen and would only cause more problems if it did, but an amusing thought. Mostly the amazing thing is that they’ve got close to 70 women, over half of whom are paid up, working together. A little push towards collective action. Next up: 40 hour work week and paid maternity leave… ;)


29 October

Spent the morning sorting beans after my walk - Abdu had harvested the two improved varieties together (sigh) and I had to sort them to weigh them. Sat in front of the small mosque near my house with the men and they helped me sort red and black ‘noses’. Got around 2.5 kg total - most of them the red varieties - crappy harvest thanks to all the bugs (thanks to us not getting the promised pesticide in time thanks to Dr. K…) Didn’t have enough of the black to even make a full half kilo. Talked to maigari and apparently the Yammata women want to start their own asusu. Sa’a’ comes back tomorrow or Friday - will try to talk to her then.

30 October

Began the day much too early, tromping out to Mai gari’s field in the daggi, getting covered in evil pokey stickers for my trouble. The field had been pretty much destroyed by bugs - approximately 0.1 kg each line, though the local cultivar was still putting out fresh leaves and flowers. The improved varieties were finished. Headed to Yammata next, where Adamou got results more in keeping with Abdou - 2 kilos fo the red beans, 0.05kg of the black, zero local. Shitty year all around and Adamou was one of the ones that managed to get some insecticide, albeit apparently too late to be of use… **sigh** started making a collage of life here - tea and camels and sai hankuri. Should fill the page by the end of service. Also trying to improve my pathetic drawing skills - I certainly have the time.

2 November

When night comes and you too are dark, lie down and be dark with a will. And when morning comes and you are still dark stand up and say to the day with a will ‘I am still dark.’ It is stupid to play a role with the night and day. They would both laugh at you.
- Khalil Gibran Sand + Foam

Spent most of Friday and Saturday in a vegetative state on my bed either asleep or reading. Guess my body wanted a break. Came back from the last bean guy in Kahuta Friday morning, did laundry, flopped down for a ‘quick nap’ and woke up around 6 pm. Saturday I managed to go as far as Abdu’s down the street to greet them on their biki but then scampered back to lay down. Not a terribly exciting couple of days. No fever but general overall achy ness. Still have a bit of head and neck ache but nothing compared to the past two days. Already went to the market once today for tuwo and a pagne - needed to break a 5 mille bill and I want to get a shirt made while I’m in Maradi. Turns out the fabric lady also goes to El Coelta, Barkatou’s market town and so got to see what she’d apparently just bought. I got a red and gold fabric to pseudo-match the one I already have a skirt of. Will head back later for fanke.

3 November

Came in this morning for the election party tomorrow. We’ll be taking over a local restaurant and watching the results into the wee hours of the morning. It’s the first time I think everyone’s been in for a while, so I’m excited to see everyone. I’m more excited, though, to vote the bastards out of office and install a new, forward-thinking President that we can all be proud of. And now to go put on my Obama button and head to the net café to post this.

:)
M